Update on 9-25-16: Calvary Lutheran Church has a full time food coordinator, Karla Roberts, who started at Calvary last year after many years in a high school cafeteria kitchen. Karla manages the menus and a crew of volunteers to cook, serve and clean up after the Wednesday meals. She is also responsible for all the other dining needs of the congregation, including funerals, potlucks, council meetings, new member meals, and much more. I continue to help Karla as a volunteer in the kitchen most weeks, and keep this blog updated with the weekly menus. If anyone has any recipe requests, I can get them from Karla and post them here. Just send me a message to the blog or email me at kschleusener@gmail.com. Thanks to the 138 followers my blog has gained over the years, and thanks those of you who contributed to the 85,520 all time views to the blog as of today since I started it in 2012.
Karen Schleusener
This was my original blog description from when we started up our Wednesday meal ministry at Calvary 9 years ago:
Cook a meal for 500+ people? Feed them in the space of an hour and a half? 25 times a year? With no background in the culinary arts? With a crew of all volunteers in a church kitchen? Sure, count me in, I said. From humble beginnings of potlucks or hurried trips to pick up fast food on Wednesday education nights, Calvary Lutheran Church of Rapid City, SD embarked on a journey to bring the congregation closer together as a church family, one Wednesday evening meal at a time. Four years since it’s inception, the Wednesday Evening Meal has grown from an average attendance of 280 to 525. Wow, I say to myself every Thursday morning, when the frenzy of the cooking, dining and cleaning of the day before is done. What an experience, what a miracle, what a privilege it is to be involved in this ministry. Many people have asked me, as the coordinator of the meals, to share recipes, insights, and stories of how we manage to serve this many people every week, and on a budget of a suggested donation of $4 per person collected at each meal. So here you go…stories, photos, recipes and more. (The word might just get out now of how much fun we’re having in the kitchen, when everyone thinks we are just working so hard.) Hopefully, I’ll hear back from readers with suggestions for menus, recipes, cooking tips, etc.
I hope you enjoy the blog,
Karen Schleusener
35 Cheesecakes…Check!
thenewchurchsupper 
Comments on: "Cooking at Calvary" (5)
“We approve mama schleus, nice first blog entry!” -EmJ
“I don’t have anything creative to say…I hope you blog takes off like Jesus walkin on water!” -Sprecher
“Woo! Go mama! Love it!” -me
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Yay! I can’t wait to read more!
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Love it! Can’t wait to read more – and see it on the big screen someday just like Julie & Julia.
– MStens
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Thanks for the blog and your meals, you rock! Cookies tonight were amazing and thanks for thr recipes! Connie Lundgren
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Thanks and I’m glad you are enjoying both the blog and the cookies!
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